Maintain Your Expat Marriage
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Relocating with your spouse can be a significant challenge. Living across an ocean can challenge some marriages, leading some expat couples to the verge of divorce.
And yet, living overseas is both fun and hard. To make it through the experience, support from both partners is vital. Continue reading for additional guidance on maintaining harmony in a successful expat marriage abroad.
Manage Expectations
As with any international relocation, alone or with your spouse, you need to be rigorous about managing your expectations. It’s so important to talk about each person’s expectations for the move.
- Is a change a way for you two to spend more quality time together?
- Is the move strictly for work or your studies?
- How much time will you personally and individually like to spend on certain components (tourist things, exploring, etc.) of your move?
To avoid disappointment or resentment, it’s best to ensure that both partners know what to expect in their new country.
Positive Interactions
Once you settle in your new country, remember that you two are all each other has as you grieve and try to cope with this shock. Expats often experience homesickness that can leave them feeling alone.
Quality time together is essential when you’ve moved abroad. It’s also essential to spend time together after you’ve moved abroad. You are each other’s support system. Daily positive interactions with each other can go a long way. A few minutes a day with each other can do wonders.
Don’t Give Too Much
You’re moving abroad for your spouse’s job, meaning you’ve already sacrificed a lot for the relocation: You have already made significant sacrifices for the relocation, including your own career.
This relocation requires a significant investment of time and energy. Emotional cost. When you and your spouse first go abroad, they may be working too closely together (the company is small) and putting in more hours at the job, which is causing more stress for both of you.
You might be tempted to take on more onto your plate to help alleviate some of your partner’s stress, but you shouldn’t give and give until you’ve nothing left. If you give of yourself until you’re entirely spent, you may end up angry and resentful toward your partner.
Rather than immediately trying to absorb more onto your plate, ask your partner what they need help with and tell them the things YOU need help with. Many people aren’t great about asking for help when they need it (me included, if I’m being honest), which may result in their partner assuming that they don’t need it—and this can cause serious problems.
Conveying what you want from one another properly is more important than ever during an international move.
Communication
And while communication is key to a successful relationship, that’s never more true than when you’re uprooting and moving internationally. Both partners have a part in the move, which means that both share as much information as possible about what they are doing for the move.
Either spouse having any concern about the move or at any time during it, especially when you’re already working overseas, should be voiced and addressed, not just dismissed.
Leaving your comfort zone for an entirely new country is daunting—no matter what. Television shows and movies romanticize the idea of moving abroad for love or with your love, so it seems like there is no downside to taking the leap..
As any relationship takes work and dedication to survive, a move abroad requires it even more so when there isn’t the safety net of family and friends to lean on in your new home.